People want brands to make them smile and laugh, but business leaders fear using humour in customer interactions according to new research.
The Happiness Report from Oracle Fusion Cloud Customer Experience and five-time New York Times bestselling author Gretchen Rubin, includes insights from more than 12,000 consumers and business leaders across 14 countries including the UAE.
They found that people are searching for new experiences to make them smile and laugh and will reward brands that embrace humour with loyalty and repeat purchases, but walk away from those that don’t.
Its data showed that 90 percent of people believe brands can do more to deliver happiness to their customers and 96 percent said they preferred brands to be funny.
A total of 88 percent are more likely to remember ads that are funny, yet business leaders said that only 14 percent of their brands’ offline ads (TV, billboards) and 16 percent of their online ads actively use humour.
60 percent of people don’t believe they have a relationship with a brand unless it makes them smile or laugh and 50 percent would walk away from a brand if it didn’t make them laugh or smile regularly.
Gretchen Rubin, five-time New York Times bestselling author and podcaster, said: “For brands aiming to contribute to the happiness of their target audience, the process starts with data and knowing your customers.
“Only then can you bring the appropriate mix of humor, personality, and brand experience that will drive loyalty and brand advocacy.”
89 percent of business leaders state that they do not have the data insights or tools to successfully deliver humour.
Business leaders would be more confident using humour when engaging with customers if they had better customer visibility (58 percent) and access to advanced technologies like artificial intelligence (45 percent).
“The customer experience continues to evolve, but at the end of the day, it all comes down to one thing: Making the customer happy,” said Rob Tarkoff, executive vice president and general manager, Oracle Advertising and Customer Experience.
“As the results show, most business leaders want to make consumers laugh more and understand it’s a critical part of establishing a true relationship. To be successful, brands need to put data at the heart of their customer experience strategy.”
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